It doesn't need to market itself, it just needs to be the right tool for the right job. Take the eee pc for example. They are flying off of the shelves in the UK. Do people care that it's running Linux? Not really.

In order to be more marketable, Linux must be more shippable.

I know very little about this. Things have been said about synchronising releases. Better support for ISVs. Settling on a standard set of libraries for desktop-facing distros and so on?

All I know is that the default Xandros on the eee pc is arse. It's clunky and unreliable to update. It's hard as hell to install software on. I have no hope of installing Firefox 3 on it. Given that, I also don't expect Firefox 3 to be packaged by Asus anytime soon, if ever. What good is that?

Could you explain your point a bit? First you are saying that Linux needs to be the right tool for the job. Then you are saying that the eee flies although the default installation on it is crap. How does that match?

Then you are saying that the eee flies although the default installation on it is crap. How does that match?

The default image is actually quite good. It boots in 23 seconds and the interface is perfect for the uses the device is intended for. I have one. And I have used several distros on it... and came back to the preinstalled image.

Now, if one is specifically looking for something else, Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora or whatever might be best for that situation.

The default install actually has an "advanced" mode which is easy to unlock. It yields a full KDE desktop. I monitored a thread, a while back, on the EEE PC user forum which asked people what interface they actually used. Overwhelmingly, people used the default interface. Many had tried advanced mode and other distros. But, like me, most of them settled on the customized Xandros interface eventually.

I agree that "Linux" doesn't need to market itself, but I think the success of the Eee says a lot about the resistance of the normal user to Linux. When I started using Linux, I had several DOS boxes laying around and if the install went bad I really didn't lose anything. The typical PC user is not going to risk their bright shiny new machine by installing something on it that they have very little experience with. Especially with the winfolks telling them horror stories. If they can pick up a box that already has Linux on it and get their feet wet, sure why not. Probably 70% of PC users couldn't care less what OS is on their machine as long as they don't have to install it. Agree totally with the article in that to best advocate Linux, help people who have questions about it. Heck, help them when they have questions about windows. The biggest problem I had with Linux in the beginning was the "RTFM" attitude that so many people had. That has to go away or Linux will never grow.

Success? With who? A few geeks who bought it? It hasn't been a success outside geek circles. Being on sale in a few countries in a few shops... is not a sign, as the article puts it, that 'Beginners' are 'Flocking to' the 'Eee'. It just means a few LUG put presure on a few shops to sell it, it get withdrawn in a year or too when the managers realises that all five members of the the LUG already bought one - infact they were responsable for the rush of sales that led his store to think that the Eee's were 'flying of the shelves'.

When Oprah starts talking about Linux or Eee's, that's when you could start saying that beginners are flocking to the Eee or Linux for that matter.

Flying of the shelves, I'm from the uk, I work as web programmer, I don't know anyone who has one or knows anyone who knows someone else who does... I know your all waiting to mention your Grandmothers and six year old kid brothers, but outside of geekdom the Eee and Linux aint flying any where.

windows gets free marketing by being preinsalled on the majority of home computers sold...

That's why partnerships with hardware vendors, like Dell has with Ubuntu. Not many windows based users would know about3d special effects on most of the new Linux based distros or how easy synaptic is to install/update softwares. Most of the PC users (home users) are using Windows based PC for writing documents (mostly like a typewriter), playing/downloading movies, chatting, Internet browsing. All of these things can be done using Linux without much difficulty, installing vlc, mplayer, codecs required to play songs can be done through menu without having to goto any site. This is a big deal and the Linux distros need to market themselves better. I have many friends who use windows as their prime OS and most pf them have been wowed by the Linux install on my laptop, or the way by which I install or update applications. Linux is not just for geeks its also for people who appreciate beauty, artists.

When ever screenshots of any Linux distros are shown the basic, mostly dull interface are shown. I know most people must like hence it exists, but to a common user (windows user) the beauty of the interface does count. Hope I made some sense.

I actually like the fact there are hundreds of Linux distros on the market.

I'm new to Linux and have only tried a handful, but it's nice to know there are choices for different needs.

IMHO, Linux cannot succeed by itself, for desktop use at least. Hardware manufacturer's and companies that make proprietary stuff (Adobe..etc) have to lend support as well.... but as long as Microcrap is around, waving it's checkbook and threatening manufacturers to backtrack on Open Source support (eg:Asus), Linux will face a tough battle.

Well, the rebellion did beat the evil empire in that famous trilogy (forgot the title) , so there's always hope. Maybe Google will lend Linux more help in future.

Who knows, in the future, just as Linux is about to overtake Microcrap in market share, Steve Ballmer may come up to Linus Torvalds and use the "I am your Father" line... just before chopping off Linus' USB cords.

I'm old to Linux based OS and I also like the fact that hundreds of different OS happen to use the Linux kernel at there core. Some very specialized, some very general. I May spend most of my time with one distro but that doesn't bar me from using other distros and specialty builds where applicable.. and I'm not "new to linux".

This all comes back to a fundamental flaw in our community's perception of Linux. "Linux" does not need to be marketed to consumers. Linux is not an operating system, but a family of operating systems; most of which are binary incompatible. All of the different operating systems are built with common components, like the Linux kernel, and have many simularities, but as far as the end user is going to be concerned they should be treated as completely different OSes. We need to stop trying to make Linux a common household term and instead need to try to get names like Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, Suse and so on out there. I promise you when a non technical user somehow ends up with Ubuntu on his/her system and tries to install a app or game that was packaged for Fedora they won't care that they share a common kernel when it doesn't work.

I promise you when a non technical user somehow ends up with Ubuntu on his/her system and tries to install a app or game that was packaged for Fedora they won't care that they share a common kernel when it doesn't work.

A non-technical user user would probably stick to installing directly from the repos, since that would be the easiest way for a newbie user to install stuff, so compatibility shouldn't really be a problem.

Back in the day, I chewed a few installs by crossing repositories. It may be an rpm but that doesn't mean all rpm based distros are going to like it. rpmfind.net can go badly.

In the case of Windows lifers, all they've ever known is download from a third party or get third party media to install aftermarket software so it's not so odd that they would thing finding an rpm or tarball should just work with whatever; it's all "Linux" for them still.

Heck, last week I responded to a forum post too find out a user chewed there Ubuntu install by crossing repositories.

I agree fully that "Linux" should be dropped as a catch-all frase meaning "that Cool trendy thing that isn't Windows or Apple" and instead refer to specific distributions. As originally pointed out; they are all similar but distinctly different OS which happen to be build from the same lego pieces though the pieces are not stacked in the same order. Debian is not the same as Suse which is not Mandriva. Debian and Ubuntu are not even the same OS and that's one of the closest parent/child forks at the moment.

and many many more programs are distributed as a single binary that runs just fine on any of the major, LSB compliant distributions. Problems do occur when using package managers, but those are not usually necessary for most programs.

Interesting choice with the Flash player there... 'cause ever since I started using Ubuntu 8.04 it's been ultra buggy and crashes all the time. This was not happening with prior versions, and it can't really be attributed to Firefox3 since this issue does not exist on my Windows boxes at work, nor back when I was running the beta on Ubuntu 7.10. I've seen hundreds of people on the internet and a good handful in real life who have the same issues. Interesting thing is, when I run FF in a terminal I get all sorts of nice GTK and GLIB errors popping up while Flash is locking everything up. The reason for all of this is because Flash was compiled specifically for different versions of these libraries than are included with Ubuntu. Then combine versioning issues with custom compiles and forks and no...I'm sorry but if you think that binary compatibility is not an issue apparently you've just been really really lucky so far.

On the other hand...sure, every package could simply staticly link/include all the libraries it needs, but what happens when you try to run it on a really interesting distro like Gobo Linux? ...will it still work? I used to be a big supporter of the Autopackage project because I thought they had it figured it out, but then I finally realized what I already stated in my original post. Program installation is the number one issue holding Linux based OSes back (has been for the last 5 years I've been using them at least), and it's never going to stop until people quit calling their OS "Linux".

Flash runs fine on 8.04, in fact the culprit _is_ FireFox3. As part of OlySoft's nonprofit work we give away computers that are donated to us to families that can't afford a computer. These are by default lower end machines, and since 8.04 I have had several complaints regarding the slowness of Youtube stuff. After looking at it and watching it's behaviour I was able to correct it by installing FF2 from the repos. I just changed their icon at the top to run FF2 instead of FF3 and life is good again.

If only Adobe would compile the Flash player against 64bit libraries already. I'm almost ready to install the 32bit FF on my 64bit OS just so Adobe's crap works for me with 90% of the websites out there. Ick.. I hate the thought of having to stuff a 36bit build into my system just because Adobe can't get there sht together.

As one of the "Linux Guys" at a Microsoft support shop, I can attest that a lot more Windows admins would push Linux if they could figure out how to connect it to a Windows domain. From the "Linux-must-be-the-only-OS" perspective, this would be a reversal of the Embrace-Extend thing.

Authentication and ACLs are the big hurdle there. Group Policy would be handy, but loads of people don't need it- not near so much as they need it tied to their existing AD.

Much simpler Windows domain integration would be an enormous marketing tool. But hey, that's just one facet.

Good one there, you make it sound easy...like it should already have been done. My understanding is that Microsoft will not release information to do the heavy lifting in some of these areas in any manner that allows that information to become open.

Remember that it took billions of dollars of fines and continued harrasment by the EU to get Microsoft to finally capitulate and put out a concise whitepaper a few months ago so that the SAMBA team could finally get a good look at how Microsoft implements various network APIs.

As you point out this kind of thing is one reason GNU/Linux is not yet as ubiquitous as Windows. Of course that reason has a great deal to do with Window's fighting tooth and nail against the 'cancer' of FOSS.

Getting Linux to authenticate against AD isn't terribly difficult- if you're a Linux admin. Show the process to even a highly competent Windows admin and they'll ask why you can't just right click on My Computer, click Computer Name, tell it the name of the domain and a domain admin's credentials, reboot and enjoy.

I've never used LikewiseOpen, though, which sounds zounds easier than the long way. Thanks for the link, ZephyrXero!

It seems the issues supporting a Linux based OS as a client under Windows AD is within the Windows LDAP side. Put most any other AD server in there and everything including Windows clients seem to work fine.

I'm eager to see if Suse's Bill Blessed AD support makes a difference though. As for Samba, Linux/BSD based OS do Windows shares better than Windows; I love that little irony.

As one of the "Linux Guys" at a Microsoft support shop, I can attest that a lot more Windows admins would push Linux if they could figure out how to connect it to a Windows domain. From the "Linux-must-be-the-only-OS" perspective, this would be a reversal of the Embrace-Extend thing.

Authentication and ACLs are the big hurdle there. Group Policy would be handy, but loads of people don't need it- not near so much as they need it tied to their existing AD.

Much simpler Windows domain integration would be an enormous marketing tool. But hey, that's just one facet.

Having been in large organisations, I can assure you that most never use the avanced features of AD; even Microsoft admitted this when Windows 2003 was released. What did they do? they tried to market those features, but most administrators were quite happy with the status quo. With that being said, there are other 'desktop management solutions' besides Microsoft.

I wish so-called 'IT Administrators' spent a little time googling, because off the top of my head I can think of maybe a couple which could be drop in replacements.

My cousin in the US Air Force once ranted about all the fantastic capabilities of Group Policy, then stated, "and the Air Force uses it to make dead certain the user gets the right wallpaper at startup."

..means there needs to be some method by which the average user can buy a ten dollar (USD) cd with applications and games in a clunky interface which displays screenshots of the application or games in question.

Currently I and a friend are trying to sell P4 1.7 GHZ machines with 512MB RAM and 64MB video cards and a 40GB hard disk with DVD\CRW combo drives with Ubuntu on them for $50.00 (USD) and the biggest issues so far seem to be the question of whether or not they can use their small library of bargain basement shareware\freeware cds from Walmart. Apparently having "shovelware" available is part of being user friendly?

--bornagainpenguin

PS: As far as the Xandros Linux on the ASUS Eee goes, some of the dislike comes from people who wish to punish Xandros for their deal with Microsoft. The rest of us may like the default interface, but we're dissatisfied with the lack of intelligent integration for adding new applications to that default interface. It's as if Xandros completely failed to consider the possibility anyone would want to add software to their new computers...

Actually, I think a vendor could do a nice default WINE setup within there distro for a preinstall and have the system know to route the windows software into it. I don't see the average user installing WINE after market and having it just work though but I haven't looked at it in a rather long time either so my memory is not too clear.

Sure--if I were willing to be full-time tech support for these people, which I'm not. They're getting a $50.00 (USD) computer with a working and fully updated OS on it---what more do they want really?

Besides, as I quickly learned awhile back while using IE4Linux--installing WINE also means viruses can run if you're not careful! Granted they may not be able to damage the OS like they would in an actual Windows install, but the resource use is still there. And to be honest I think having something like Wine or making the desktop resemble Windows too much has a negative effect on people, because they subconciously expect the Operating System to behave like Windows and will get frustrated when it doesn't conform to their expectations.

The way I have these machines setup, you can see out of the gate you're running something different than Windows or MacOS. The people who've bought them already know they're getting something else and the desktop reinforces this. Like but different is my mantra here.

Plus even if you discount the threat of resource hogging viruses, the psychological issues that arise from looking or behaving like Windows, you've still got the biggest issue when it comes to WINE... It doesn't work 100% of the time. So from there on in the frustration mounts as program after program doesn't behave the way they expect it to, to the point they forget when it does work like they'd expect. Really the miracle of WINE is that it works as well as it does, IMHO...

jabbotts said...

hehe.. I couldn't resist.

Actually, I think a vendor could do a nice default WINE setup within there distro for a preinstall and have the system know to route the windows software into it. I don't see the average user installing WINE after market and having it just work though but I haven't looked at it in a rather long time either so my memory is not too clear.

See above, also see the history of Xandros, Linspire, and other distros that have shipped with Crossover Office in the past, preconfigured like you suggest. Granted WINE is more mature now and may work better in the scheme you describe, but even in that case I recommend studying the history of IBM's OS/2 and their strategy of a "better Windows than Windows" and see how well that worked out for them...

I have read this elsewhere. I may buy one here later this year, but am now waiting to see what Acer is going to bring to market...it's great isn't it? All the new stuff coming out with GNU/Linux already in it? Problem is I worry that some of these folks, like Xandros and the Eee, are getting some important stuff wrong.

I've been using the Ubuntu distribution since 7.04. It started as an experiment. Actually, I tried mkLinux back on my PowerPC 604-based Mac clone years ago and again, another version of Linux only about 3 years ago.

Until Ubuntu, I wasn't really successful and yet, without doing some extra work, I still can't use the machine for much more than development or creating documents. Someone's grandmother might do better than I do, but I have my doubts.

I can't play restricted DVDs because the extra download failed each time and it doesn't offer a second opportunity.

For someone who is completely without knowledge to pick any machine that happens to have a Linux distribution on it, they'll be fine until they run into a problem, but it's going to take shrink-wrapped products to get people to recognise Linux and help them through their difficulties.

It's easy to say that there is nothing wrong with Linux and that people are being picky but that's simply not true for the majority of people. They're not going to open a shell and start fixing things. They'd rather throw the computer out the door.

I keep trying Gnash but I always end up pulling it back off the system after hitting youtube and a few other sites. I'm probably just unlucky though. I do keep trying form time to time for when it does start doing what I need though.

Microsoft is big because they are big in Business. People use Windows cause it's what they have at the office. Its what I know.

Linux companies need to focus on making Linux the OS of choice in new markets (China, India, Africa)

Also Linux companies need to get the release cycle down to something like Apple. Putting in a bunch of new stuff each time a new version comes out and not fixing what you already have.

Stop changing the default application list. Don't change the default email client with each release. Find the one that your users want and then stick to it and make it work. If people want to add something else they are welcome to do it.

The other market I think is that they can go for kids and teens. Market in the US on places like qvc. Preloaded Linux machines for your kids. A machine they can't kill.

Just need some bright marketers to get out there and make it happen. Apple made the biggest come back in us corporate history with slick marketing and cool products. Remember the bubble iMac. Blueberry and Strawberry etc. Stupid but kids ate it up.

What is interesting is that a lot of people would rather buy a fake Mac from Psystar for $400 or build a hacked up PC to run Mac OS then to go out and get a $200 Linux machine. That says a lot.

but in all seriousness it is all about marketing and putting linux in the face of consumers.

people have 'heard' about linux but because they only hear about it from people working in IT it turns them off. it really isn't that hard to pick up and use linux it's just that there is a complete user cluelessness about it in every way.

That and games, the one thing that kept me from full time linux for the longest amount of time was running games. in fact i still have a partition on a hard drive somewhere with vista on it, just in case a decent game comes along that isn't on my 360.

If Wine can make an easy way to install the DLL's from a product install or at least try and explain this when installing a program that would help a lot.

Wine works 1000% better than when i first started but to anyone who has never used linux before telling tham you can install some of their windows programs on linux is just going to frustrate them when they don't know how to add dll's.

users just want a computer, they don't need games beyond solitare, maybe they want something pretty but ultimately they just want something that gets the job done. every os is capable of fitting these needs.

Then people who play games want games first before anything else. even on the EEEpc forum i saw a post titled "will it play WOW?".

That is how much a single thing will sway opinion.

My point was that you need to be able to fill these spaces and games are still too difficult to get running on linux.

As far as everything else is concerned i've started a lot of people on ubuntu 8.04 and moved some of them to debian. There isn't a large learning curve beyond repos and GNOME navigation.

The "they just work" opinion annoys me because every OS can just work. If OEM's started putting Linux on machines they would be doing the same thing i do. making a fresh install usable to the person taking one home for the first time.

it's up to OEM's to create a similar style of base install that includes what people need without them having to do it themselves.
the reason Macs have an advantage here is because they own all the apps people want on a mac so they are easy to bundle.

The distro's give you the base, the OEM builds the machine and customises, then the user takes it home and says "wow, it just works"

The problem is every OS doesn't just work. Windows doesn’t just work. Its a slow buggy nightmare for most users. Same with Ubuntu. Even preloaded its still buggy and can drive a person crazy.

With the Mac it's like a clock, you turn it on, do your business and turn it off. More like a device then a PC. Almost the same as the iPhone. You turn it on and use it. Its not perfect it but the normal user doesn't notice the bugs.

Apple is in the same position that the Japanese car companies are in.

Apple is Honda. They are known for making great cars, you pay more for them but that last longer and they have a high resale value. All around it's worth it.

MS is like GM. They are making much better cars now; some people will even say that their new cars are better then Honda and Toyota. Even though their cars are ugly they sell a lot because they have a lower price which makes for a bigger market. But all the years of making crappy cars has killed their reputation. Most of the people who buy GM do it because it's what they can afford and know. Or they are loyal Americans.

Linux companies are more like Hyundai for years they made the tough little beater. The car that people beat up etc but didn't care because it was cheap and fun. Only problem is that they have a reputation for being less reliable then GM. Yeah owners have figured out how to get around the short comings but the normal person still isn't buying that. Hyundai is slowly trying to grow market share and they are doing well but I doubt they will ever get to the level of a Honda or GM.

The funny thing is that like Hyundai, Linux has the market for heavy equipment. Hyundai makes all kinds of heavy equipment and is big in that market like Linux is big on servers

Apple ha always developed towards the goal of an Information Appliance. Insert bread then wait for the pop and your toaster does the rest. Insert plate, press the time and start button and your microwave does the rest. Apple's goal is an information appliance that is as intuitive and efficient enough to be an information toaster or microwave.

It's a very different perception and aproach than focusing only on a general purpose OS. I love using the osX machine at home though I still spend most of my keyboard time infront of other machines and agree with Apple's other business strategies about as much as I do with MS business policy.

Why are you surprised that people prefer to spend $400 for a windows box than $200 for a linux box?
At least they know what they are getting. I know enough about windows and linux and I know that for those $200 for a linux box I am getting the same old, retread software, the same old retread games, nothing new, nothing innovative in any way. Most linux applications are copies of successfull windows apps. It is time for linux to begin creating the needs ahead of computer users wants (that's what windows and apple do), not just copying whatever apple and windows does.
Even gnome. It began, (and it said so in their website at the time I read this a few years ago. They have since changed their goal statement), as an imitation of the apple desktop. That is typically what linux does. Copy, copy, copy!

Why are you surprised that people prefer to spend $400 for a windows box than $200 for a linux box?

Actually what I said was: "What is interesting is that a lot of people would rather buy a fake Mac from Psystar for $400 or build a hacked up PC to run Mac OS then to go out and get a $200 Linux machine. That says a lot."

Nothing about Windows.

And speaking of copies, remember Windows from the beginning was and still is nothing but a copy of the Mac OS. To the point of Apple even suing them and getting money out of MS for copying.

Thank you for the tip about Psystar (http://psystar.com/). I hadn't heard of them. They may be what I'm looking for.

I have this dream. I want to simultaneously run Linux, OS X, Windows and NetBSD on the same machine at the same time using KVM. I don't know if it can be done, but Pystar looks like the right platform to try it on.

What is interesting is that a lot of people would rather buy a fake Mac...

Wait until some more figures are in the UMPCs and then see. It's quite likely that a hefty percentage of folks either won't notice that their new gizmo is running Xandros or a custom Linux rather than Windows or they will notice but won't care so long as it works. Aside from enthusiasts, folks don't buy operating systems, they buy computers, laptops, mobiles, printers, whatever and for software run they what the item comes with. Linux will spread more widely via the brand names of distros, and only if it provides top-class, secure, well-supported and cost-effective software with said hardware. "Linux", in so far as it exists, is never going to acquire a billion-dollar marketing budget so in the consumer markets it's hard to see how else it will spread, other than by piggybacking on hardware.

I recently recieved some marketing blurb from Microsoft, asking me to try Vista (Soley, no XP) for 30 Days, as after a year my opinions might have changed.

I think Linux could do with the same sort of marketing. Try linux for 30 days (soley) and see what you think of it.

Currently as everyone knows Microsoft is pushing hard to defeat the negative PR around Vista, i would watch what Microsoft and indeed apple does when it comes to marketing and try and mimic this for linux.

Currently Linux vast majority of users comes from word of mouth (i.e. friends handing out CDROMS) which i think is a good thing.

I think with linux marketing there has to be a big company behind it, trying to make a profit. The small bespoke IT shops on the high street are good, but you need a HP or a Dell to be actively pushing linux as it's primary OS (yes i know both these manufactures have a linux range, but i find this range small and obscured on their websites and marketing materials).

If we did have this large company it might be able to push into larger vendors such as PCWorld (im in the UK), perhaps having a stand with a dedicated sales team/person explaining the virtues of using Linux (Apple does the very same thing in their own stores).

I also agree that the idea of appliance or tailored linux systems being a big way forward. The specially tailored xandros distrubution is a winner, i setup what i think of as appliance linux servers, they are truely geared to perform one job. Yes windows servers can be geared to also one job, but because of windows do everything approach you find you still have a lot of that do everything approach left. (Server core is a good path to get to that appliance mentaility)

In one respect linux itself doesn't need to be marketed as linux when it comes to devices, the devices themselves market them. The desktop linux however could do with a really big push, there has not been a better time to do it. Many windows users are cheesed off with the many problems in vista (a lot of users i have spoke to outside my company have had enough of windows vista and just want something that works and lets them get their work done). Apple sees this and the mac's are making inroads so there's no reason why linux can go full steam ahead.

That's true. You can have a system configured for special tasks and maybe it will be ok (though I have doubts since, when you go specialized, you need drivers support which is something Linux lacks).

Anyway, that's not what it would need to achieve a better global presence. Take OS X: they turned a Unix system into a quite good system to use. Of course, Apple had big problems until latest releases, but however they showed that having a good desktop based on Unix is possible.

funny thing, the eeepc is a specialized device (basically a trimmed down typewriter and internet portal) and it has drivers for all its needs.

i would go so far as claim that specialized uses are where linux outside of the server room specifically thrive.

as for osx, that could be claimed to be a custom desktop environment on top a bsd kernel and cups (apple bought that printer system recently iirc). kinda like if kde or gnome was the only linux desktop around.

in that sense, the interchangeability of parts that make up a linux distro is its own worst enemy. as you cant say that lib x,y or z will be available on every install, its hard to package a binary (the form that most third party app suppliers are used to on both osx and windows). but others see this flexibility as a huge breath of fresh air vs the rigid control of windows and osx.

mostly i think that the issue is difference in mentality. there is a huge mental inertia tied up to how things have been done so far in the world of for-sale software.

this however seems to be changing as the computer may be morphing from a singular gray box to something that is inside everything, doing its own special thing and talking to a multitude of other computers inside other things, and so on...

pandora, openmoko, mid's, there seems to a lot of interesting projects orbiting around linux these days.

funny thing, the eeepc is a specialized device (basically a trimmed down typewriter and internet portal) and it has drivers for all its needs.
I was infact saying that specialized tasks could be a good niche for Linux systems. However, EeePC cannot be compared to general usage. EeePC is successfull because there's a hardware company behind it, which took care to build an "appliance" and provide all drivers for it.

That's not the general rule, however. I'm not sure you could find a Linux driver for most hi-end or pro graphics card used for professional A/V systems, for example.

Same thing for many hi-end printers, scanners and so on. As I said, however, specialized tasks are something where Linux could prove successfull but those are niche markets. We were talking about general desktop market.

kinda like if kde or gnome was the only linux desktop around.
Level of integration OS X has cannot be compared to a Linux distro using KDE or Gnome, actually.

in that sense, the interchangeability of parts that make up a linux distro is its own worst enemy. as you cant say that lib x,y or z will be available on every install, its hard to package a binary (the form that most third party app suppliers are used to on both osx and windows). but others see this flexibility as a huge breath of fresh air vs the rigid control of windows and osx.
Agreed. But this is flexibility good to build custom niche "experiences". Building a general desktop system, "good enough for eveything or most things", is a task of different order of complexity, as Apple knows very well. While their system is not that bad, OS X and Apple still have a fraction of market and didn't move so quickly in past 4-5 years.

this however seems to be changing as the computer may be morphing from a singular gray box to something that is inside everything, doing its own special thing and talking to a multitude of other computers inside other things, and so on...
Don't forget that was computing before PCs. And has proved not to be successfull enough to survive. Of course, that's where MOST profits are (i.e. selling YOUR system as opposed to selling a gray box which you could custom build and configure). However, that failed in the past and, most likely, will fail again. There's some space for appliances (consoles, iPods, you name it) and they could even be more successfull than in the past years because of enhanced compatibility among eterogenous systems. But, in the end, "PC model" is the best business model for consumers and will always prevail.

pandora, openmoko, mid's, there seems to a lot of interesting projects orbiting around linux these days.
This is exactly why Windows decide to provide Windows2008 Core: to engage Linux in appliances.

i dont know if matrox counts as high end graphics, but i distinctly recall them being active in their linux support...

but high end gear, like big iron computers, are often big investments that have a dedicated support agreement going for years.

unless we have different views about what makes high-end gear that is...

as for whats best for the consumer, gray box or appliances, i dont know. i have mixed opinions about both things. the gray box protect the consumer from lock-in. but the appliance protects, to some degree, against worms and other net hazards.

imo, the biggest win for consumers will be portability of data. that they can take their data to any device and be able to access it. in that sense, open and free to implement (in both senses of free) standards are more important then what os is being used. but by having the linux ecosystem be mostly free to use helps in speeding development of these things, as it lowers the entry requirements.

but in the end there isnt a single point (like marketing) that one can point to and go "well, theres your problem". nor will there be a singular point in time one can say is the "year of desktop linux". instead there will be a continual rolling of the snowball down the hillside. and this is not a snowball that can be sued to hell, bought wholesale or any other classical tricks of anti-competitive nature...

It's not marketing. It's just that Linux is not ready for desktop. How long would people believe it's a marketing problem??

Take Linux on servers: it's good and it works and it didn't need "marketing" to get a big share of that market.

I understand it's easier to believe it's a marketing thing so this will move problem from software itself to other external factors. Handy excuse. But not real.

Users don't install Linux on servers, admins do. Admins have the technical knowledge to make those type of decisions, and the skills to complete the task. They also know where to find info about Linux.

Users may not. Users need to be told what their options are. They need help installing things. They need help learning how to use a new OS. That means marketing.

Users may not. Users need to be told what their options are. They need help installing things. They need help learning how to use a new OS. That means marketing.
Or, conversely, one could argue that developers could make a system which is easier to install, operate and manage.

Just for the same reason: server admins and desktop users are different.

And there, you don't need marketing. Honestly, that looks a big excuse not to improve.

Every product needs marketing, even Windows. The bad press that Windows Vista is getting is part of that, Vista is not near as bad as people make it out to be, but that doesn't matter. Perception is everything.